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Free versus paid web hosting
- Thread starter Scribe
- Start date
Unmetered is still not allowed in the forum, and is basically the same as "unlimited". How exactly will you let every client use as much as they want? Each server is allocated X amount of space and transfer, and if you go over then you will either be suspended or "fined" quite a bit. Thats overselling and will catch up to you. Then when that host cannot handle that load, they screw their clients by shutting down w/o notice.
Well... I have "Burstable" Bandwidth and can allocate 1TB of bandwidth to each account...
AboutWeb
New Member
A new website, with maximum 100 daily visitors, can use aprox. 1 GB of BW every month, unless you have a site with tons of images which will eat more BW.
Okay... I suppose I'll be fine then, at least for a while.
When it comes to images, isn't it possible to upload images on imageshack or something,
and embed a link to them in the html?
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I'm curious, and luckily I've got the time to do some research before I sign up with anyone. I'm in no hurry, as I'm still developing my page. How does providers of free hosting make money on their business? I think knowing a little bit about this part is necessary for anyone who wants to use free hosting...
As far as I know, there are a few ways:
1. Provide paid hosting so that people sign up for your paid service once they get enough traffic.
2. Display ads/buy personal information from those signing up for your service, in return for free space.
Any other ways?
Another option is whether it is even necessary for the free hosts to make money, because it might be a lead in service to other types of business entirely such as computer consulting.
AboutWeb
New Member
Okay... I suppose I'll be fine then, at least for a while.
images, isn't it possible to upload images on imageshack or something,
and embed a link to them in the html?
I suppose you could do this, but then you run into a risk that your images might disappear after a certain period of time, or their URL might change. It's better to host images by yourself, or get a CDN service (Content Delivery Network) most of the time it is a paid service, designed for improving speed.
It is better to compress your images using free service as this one that I'm using - "Yahoo Smush It".
What the hell is "burstable bandwidth"? Sounds like an overselling scheme to me. In my experience, anything with the word "burstable" or "balloon" automatically indicate overselling.
SiberForum
New Member
How about burstable RAM at many VPS offers? Is it overselling?
Such thing as overselling is not indicated by the ways providers give their services. I think everything can be applied, including "burstable" (whatever it means) and unlimited bandwidth. Everything depends on the certain company which can be technically able or unable to provide the named services in the way they are advertised. And when they are unable we have the thing called overselling.
Yes, it is. No question about it. Burstable RAM allocates the available ram in the server to whichever VPS needs it at any given time. It's not guaranteed by any means. If all of the "burstable" ram is currently allocated to other VPS servers at the point in time in which your VPS unit needs it, then what? Essentially you're relying on shared resources that are not necessarily going to be available 100% of the time. How is that NOT overselling?
SiberForum
New Member
I am sorry for being insistent, but I do clearly understand the principles of VPS hosting, where no one says burstable ram is guaranteed. Usually hosts do provide RAM at two points - the guaranteed and burstable. In this way, guaranteed ram may be, for example, 128 MB and cannot fall lower, while bustable amount is, for example, 256 MB what means the real RAM will be somewhere inbetween the 128 and 256 MB at no fixed value. This is what understood under burstable RAM term.
Overselling is when your RAM goes down lower than amount you were guaranteed, in other words, when provider is unable to give as much resources as you were promised to be given. There is nothing like this in burstable ram or bandwidth, when we talk about professional service.
No, it's not. When you offer a VPS with 128MB of guaranteed ram and 256MB "burstable" ram, you're actually selling the customer ONLY the first 128MB. The additional 128MB would be an added bonus. Nothing more. It's part of a shared resource pool that is available to EVERY customer on the node. There is no guarantee that anything "burstable" will ever be available at any specific time, because it's not guaranteed. When you advertise 128MB of ram, 256 burstable, is that additional 128MB not shared with others? Yes, it is. If everybody needs this "burstable" ram all at once, will it be available to everybody??? NO! The same goes for overselling hard drive space. If a few people use a large amount of space, fine, but what if everybody needs a large amount of space all of a sudden on the oversold server? Same concept. The selling of a shared resource to the point in which you can not GUARANTEE (beyond a resonable doubt) that if everybody uses 100% of their allocated piece that the overall usage server wide would be < 100%, then you've oversold. Period. With "burstable" RAM, you can not make such claim, ever.
Sounds to me like we all agree the base rate should be provided. Then for this "Burstable" part, it sounds like "quantifying the Bonus" that is admitted not to be guaranteed. However, it is omitting the other half of the equation, which is something like the %liklihood of you getting the bonus at any point in time. % is greater than zero, so any one client will get it at least some of the time. Classic marketing.
% is greater than 0? In most cases, yes, but not necessarily. If a handful of clients are running resource intrinsic scripts on their VPS units, they could possibly tie up all ram in the "burstable" pool for hours, or even days, especially if you have an incompetent server admin. But then again, "burstable" ram is available on a first come first serve basis and is guanteed to nobody. So it is more less a marketing scheme by making people think they have more resources available when in reality, they might not.
Thanks for answering!
I've done a little research, and it seems as if this practice of inline linking
is ethical discussable in many ways. Not all image hosts are happy for this practise. It is also called piggybacking and bandwidth theft.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Direct_linking
This is definitively something I'm going to look further into! There are at least a
few free content delivery networks around, although I'm not sure I understand all the technical aspects behind this yet. Apparently some of these networks have to do with streaming live media, which isn't really what I'm looking for.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wikiContent_Delivery_Network#Free_CDNs
But Coral Content Distribution Networks seems very interesting:
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Coral_Content_Distribution_Network
Does this work with jpgs as well, which already are compressed?
I've done a little research, and it seems as if this practice of inline linking
is ethical discussable in many ways. Not all image hosts are happy for this practise. It is also called piggybacking and bandwidth theft.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Direct_linking
This is definitively something I'm going to look further into! There are at least a
few free content delivery networks around, although I'm not sure I understand all the technical aspects behind this yet. Apparently some of these networks have to do with streaming live media, which isn't really what I'm looking for.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wikiContent_Delivery_Network#Free_CDNs
But Coral Content Distribution Networks seems very interesting:
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Coral_Content_Distribution_Network
Does this work with jpgs as well, which already are compressed?
AboutWeb
New Member
Yes, it does work with jpg too.
WebIntellects-R
Member
When it comes to comparison between free and paid, I would say, free host is not suitable for business at all, being only good for small sites of small organizations and people. Paid services are real services.
There is one alternative to free and paid hosting that haven't been mentioned yet...
Today I spoke with my brother and he promised I'd get his old computer as a server
(2GB ram, not too old processor, etc), so I guess I could set it up from home as a server.
(I think our IP is dynamic, and I think it would be okay with our ISP). Unfortunately
we've only got 4Mbps upload, would that be enough for a site with static html and a pdfs
for download? At what point would 4Mbps be a too puny connection?
Today I spoke with my brother and he promised I'd get his old computer as a server
(2GB ram, not too old processor, etc), so I guess I could set it up from home as a server.
(I think our IP is dynamic, and I think it would be okay with our ISP). Unfortunately
we've only got 4Mbps upload, would that be enough for a site with static html and a pdfs
for download? At what point would 4Mbps be a too puny connection?
Again, if you do your research, free hosting can be just as reliable as paid hosting. Just because you have to pay for your hosting does not automatically guarantee it is better then all free hosts. I have been through 3 paid providers during my web career, all 3 simply up and left w/o notice. Is these instances, I would say simply uploading my site to another provider is much less of the hassle then contacting my credit card company and the process of chargebacks and whatnot.
Overall, perhaps paid hosting is more reliable if you group all hosts together, but as I mentioned before (and in another post here) there are hosts that are just as reliable and equal to a paid host.
Overall, perhaps paid hosting is more reliable if you group all hosts together, but as I mentioned before (and in another post here) there are hosts that are just as reliable and equal to a paid host.
